DM-Nano

Once occupied by Axon, this base under rock was used to store mainly toxic containers. It was discovered by coincidence by the Necris. The Necris have setup this base & use it as a ‘Nano’ storehouse. We can found several types of Nano, the yellow, the yellow/orange, the green & the black.

Extract the archive into “My Documents\My Games\Unreal Tournament 3\UTGame\Published\CookedPC\CustomMaps” directory. If this folder is not currently on your system, you can safely create it. The archive contains :

DM-Nano.ini
DM-Nano.txt
DM-Nano.ut3
DM-Nano_LOC_int.upk

Details

This is my second map. It took more than 800 working hours split on 9 months. There is 11 500 items in this map. I hope you will like it 😮 All armors, medium health & powerups are very easy to collect, therefore are placed in dangerous spots. About the jumpads, I made everything I can to set them right. By taking them from front, there is no problem & you get use to them rather quickly 🙂

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14 comments

Um, OK, so where do I start? I guess I should have tried this a few months ago. Looks like a little Necris influence (or is it Borg?). This is a seriously sweet and dark map; I love the attention to detail, sounds and music. Looks like that one area has a bit of a Campgrounds influence as well. This has unbelievable gameplay, good item placement, and the bots are very good in DM, TDM, CTF and Greed.

Since I have been waiting so long to try this map I might as well take the time to write everything that comes to mind. Here goes…

After a few rounds on Nano, I can say this is one of the best maps I’ve ever played on. Epic should hire you to make maps for all of their games.

Pros

-All of the meshes and textures fit perfectly into the map. Nothing looks like it was placed just to fill up space. Everything has it’s place and blends perfectly.

-The Bot pathing is incredible. Computer players use jump boots to correctly reach the invulnerability and effectively hop along pilers to receive the shield belt. After multiple rounds I still feel a bot on novice setting knows it’s way around better than me. Great job.

-The high level items are placed so you need to get to them in a specific way but are never out of reach. I also like how they are mainly placed in highly populated areas to make a sort of enjoyable chaos in major areas of the map.

-The layout is very intelligent. Specific areas of the map have their own feel and you can tell where you are. At the same time the map can be confusing, forcing the player to pay attention to where they are going and where they need to go.

Cons

-The map is fairly small but has enough passageways to make it seem big and confusing. This can be seen as both a positive and a negative depending on how you look at it so I suppose this isn’t really a con at all :d

-Thats all I can think of for the bad stuff. I could shower this map with praise all day, as could I try all day to think of one bad thing to say about it.

Bottom Line- Excellent map, perhaps the best one posted so far. The wait was worth it. A well deserved 10 out of 10.

this map is pure asskick! and the final run like a charm even on middle class computers with no fps problems….with such a level of details & lighting , u did really a “pro” job

u was right to keep ur lighting idea when others told you it was “too dark” …it s not too dark ,it just perfectly contrasted and the mix lighting/contrasts/detailed meshing gives to the map a very unique look

The map is obviously very detailed in almost every aspect of it. The visuals are very well done, especially the mesh work. You can mesh out my future maps if you like. The details like the green goop sitting in between the rocks makes you want to just run around the map for a while (with no opponents).

The layout is solid over all. There are some hallways that are longer than I would personally like, but this is a subjective thing as it’s still very fun to play.

Really the only issue I have, which you already know, is the frame rates. Granted, I think my computer is having issues as many maps and other games are a little slower than usual. Do you offer tech support?

This amount of detail will always be a challenge to achieve a balance. The long line of sights don’t help either. But that aside, the map is a definite keeper.

I know you put in a lot of work into it and whether or not we, the players/mappers, appreciate it, you should be very proud of the map. It’s something I haven’t tried to do yet and I have been mapping for a while (off and on). Maybe I should…

p.s. I agree with you completely about trying to convert this for the PS3. You will have to strip the map down soo much, it won’t even be “Nano” anymore, just “no”. 😀

played against 12 bots :
bots are very smart in it, they move and go easily every where.
the layout is fun, a lots of ways are possible.
Items placement is good to me too.
Maybe “a bit” dark on certain place, not very a problem indeed, and participate to the cool ambiance of the map.
Visually nothing to do, it’s just so well made, the meshing and the lighting work are solid, subtle and make sens 😀

c’est du lourd comme on dit chez moi 😀

Good job Steve, you can be proud of the work you have done on this one !

Needless to say, I was excited to get this one in. Play it for about a minute and you’ll see his ambition through the project. It takes some good common ideas and less conventional approaches including the old platform jumping idea (put to good use though and not overused). Nice to see them evenly spaced and big enough to jump to without falling, though I would’ve recommended adding some extra element of danger if you did happen to fall which would also increase the risk vs. reward element.

Still, for the most part its general floorplan is a lot of fun, including a variety of room shapes including big rooms and long corridors. It’s got some Z and it does well with what it’s got. The pickup placement was alright and put in appropriate spots as well.

Being the hardened critic I am though, I’ve got my gripes too. Largely a bunch of minor issues, though worth mentioning. First is the Invulnerability and Invisibility. Invisibility isn’t horrible considering his choice of weapons (you can clearly see them when they fire) and I always thought the Invulnerability was really cheap, and besides that, this isn’t the best map for it anyways.

I’m also a jumping kind of guy being from the UT2003 generation, and it really bothered me with the number of instances around the map where it looked like I could make the jump, though I’d just miss it. There’s quite a lot of these points, though also several you can make, so I wasn’t feeling too good about that either. Even the center section, you can make it from some directions though not others. Bots did okay I thought–even getting the platform jumping down, though occasionally got stuck or couldn’t always make it from a jumppad.

Overall, it’s a really cool layout marred by several, in my opinion, kinda nasty flaws that unfortunately aren’t even major fixes. If you can accept that though, you’re in for a treat.

Construction and Performance 27/30 (Hardware)

To grade this on sheer performance is simply not right, because it’s actually very good considering the outstanding map construction. (The sub-heading is a permanent change by the way) It’s not one to make you look for it’s construction quality, it just comes right out and shows you, and at that the performance is more than appropriate.

Eye Candy 20/25

This is no slouch in the visual department. Pretty much stock assets though with an alternative style, combining the tech and Necris sets and subtle lighting to create a unique looking and memorable map. It’s bold and it goes all out. It generally looks fairly convincing–some areas not as much, though others are fantastic and everything is way above average.

It doesn’t tend mix it up a whole lot (from the same general look). Most areas have similar mesh arrangements and also similar lighting, and while it’s still easy to make your way around the map, I personally could’ve gone for a bit more visual variety too. Maybe not even changed from what it is now, just adding more dynamic elements like fluids (as in like water flowing in from somewhere or in adding the risk to the platform jumping). It doesn’t look bad at all, it really looks great, I just think either more dynamic elements or variety could’ve helped it go even farther or made it feel more alive. Still, much more care and details has gone into these visuals than most other UT3 maps out there and it pays off.

The Details 15/15

I would have been highly surprised if he wouldn’t have gotten the 15 here…

Final Score 84/100

A monster build of a map that almost reaches its full potential though still has some flaws left to iron out. Still, it’s as downloadable of a map as you figured it would be, and it’s incredible construction is the kind of stuff that inspires other mappers.

Here are the Phase 4 finalists for the “Best Graphics in Map” category in its $1 Million Intel Make Something Unreal Contest. This competition rewards top mods created for Unreal Tournament 3 with cash and hardware prizes in four preliminary phases and a grand final. Visit http://www.makesomethingunreal.com for full details.

It looks great, plays smoothly for me, and has lots of paths and angles. After a few rounds through it the main things that stand out are the column hopping to get the shield belt and the organic graphics for the jump pads.